We are all works in process and remain works in process through all of our days. The new version of ourselves is always emerging. This is true at the molecular level, as billions of cells die and are born within us each day. It is also true of our experience of ourselves. What we are becoming is always being brought forth, drawn from all that we have been and been through, transformed somehow by the constant creation that is life. 

Emergence is our spiritual theme for the month of May. It is a complex and layered theme that opens many avenues for reflection, but I am called first to reflect on personal history and how the past is brought forward into the creative present. 

Our liberal religious faith likes to stress our ability to make choices. Choosing what we believe and how we will live out those beliefs is the central act of our human agency. We tend, however, to undervalue our inheritance and our ancestors and how they shape us. Many traditions, including my own African American culture, pay more attention to what we are given. The Enlightenment centering of choice can disregard the need for gratitude and the humility that makes gratitude possible. 

Rebecca Parker, at the 1998 General Assembly, delivered a lecture entitled, “What they Dreamed Be Ours to Do.” In it she spoke of her pride at being named President of Starr King School for the Ministry, the first female-identified President of a Divinity School, and her sense of individual achievement:  

“Eight years ago I moved to California to become President of Starr King School for the Ministry. Truth be told, I was feeling proud of myself. Captain of my ship and master of my soul, I had valiantly charted my course to become first, a cellist, then a minister, and now an educator. 

When I got to California, I discovered I had a passel of distant cousins I had never met. One of them, my cousin Eldon Ernst, was Dean of the American Baptist seminary at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley. He proposed an Ernst family reunion, and so we got together. When we arrived in the driveway of cousin Sally Ernst’s home, I got the first introduction to my distant cousins by reading the bumper stickers on their cars. 

One said, “If you want peace, work for justice.” 
Another, “Teachers do it with class.” 
Another, “Live Music Is Best.” 
And then there was one that said, “If you love Jesus, tithe.” 

Inside, over Jell-O salad, home-made rolls, and tuna casserole reminiscent of every church potluck I had ever attended, we said hello to one another. 

Here was Sally—a minister of religious education, and graduate of Pacific School of Religion. And here was Mike, a professional French horn player and high school music teacher. And Eldon, a seminary Dean. And, David, a United Methodist parish minister. Every single one of my distant cousins was a musician, or a minister, or a teacher—and several were all three! Not only that, the ministers were all liberal, social-activist types with an intellectual bent. And all the musicians were classical. 

Apparently I had never made any choices at all! 

My life was given to me. I did not make myself. And this is how it is. 

We receive who we are before we choose who we will become.” 

What emerges from any of us owes deep gratitude to all that we have been given by those who preceded and helped to shape us. 

I also know that the lives we have already lived shape what can emerge in our lives. The triumphs and the losses, the times of courage and times of cowardice…all of these inform how we emerge into a new day. 

The spoken word artist, Ahlaam, speaks to the complexity of this process of becoming, in her piece “Open Hearted Beauty.” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgwzHkkPZbw) 

She speaks of the history of her independence day, of the breaking and learning that she has lived through and the decision, the choice, not to be ugly…to be beautiful. Even the scars she carries add to the depth and complexity of her beauty. 

Emergence, I think, blends the powerful influence of our heritage with all of the ways life has touched us thus far, but recognizes that we still can choose, do choose each day. That blending is true, but somehow does not fully complete the picture for me. 

What has emerged in my life and through my life has also been shaped by…what to call it…luck, grace, Love. 

Perhaps our focus on “Emergence” will help us all accept that we are all both the result of our lives, as well as the creator of our lives as we move forward. Perhaps it can point to greater gratitude for what we have received and greater openness to allow the Spirit of Life to be present in our living forward. 

Blessings, 

Bill